¿Opinion: Diane Cooke

So can somebody explain to me why exactly we NEED another big Manchester parade – and why nobody has noticed that it’s planned for June 20, Father’s Day. Let’s hope we don’t get a bunch of Manc dads wearing their underpants over their trousers and hanging off the town hall roof.

I’m a party girl, me. First one to get there, last one to leave. There’s nothing I love better than an opportunity to celebrate something which is worth celebrating. And most Brits are the same. When Valentine’s Day fell on a Sunday this year, people spent all weekend getting seriously loved-up in restaurants and bars. Now we’re pushing the boat out on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. Soon we’ll be having Kids’ Day, to remind ourselves how lucky we are to have the little blighters.

Manchester has its fair share of fun days. The Caribbean Carnival has been rocking Moss Side for 30 years. Pride events have been organised in the city for 19 years and have been so successful that the event became a charity in its own right having raised thousands for LGBT and HIV communities and many other good causes. St George’s Day parade is a crowd-puller, as is this month’s Irish festival which promises a St Patrick's parade unmatched in the UK. Even the Great Manchester Run is turning into an excuse to party.

So can somebody explain to me why exactly we NEED another big Manchester parade – and why nobody has noticed that it’s planned for June 20, Father’s Day. Let’s hope we don’t get a bunch of Manc dads wearing their underpants over their trousers and hanging off the town hall roof. It could be the final straw for those beleaguered Fathers For Justice. And if it’s not them causing havoc, rumour has it that the event will be targeted by anti-capitalist protestors.

And what’s the rush? Why does the brand spanking new Manchester Day parade have to be organised this year with a deadline for the end of this month for families and groups to get involved. I’m not aware of anyone asking us for our opinions.

The “green shoots of recovery” are slowly pushing their way through this country’s economic wasteland, but that’s no excuse to get on down and party all summer long. The council is planning £37m worth of cuts, so a few million to police and clean up after such a major event is somewhat inappropriate at this time.

I’d like to do a secret poll of council staff to get their views on the subject, one of the questions being: “What would you prefer, to keep your job or have a big Manchester party?” One comment on the subject on the M.E.N website went like this: “All of this so some diversity officer, who could not find their bottom with both hands and a sniffer dog, in one town hall department or another, can prance around dressed up as a pink dragon.”

And the idea that the new Manchester Parade will rival New York’s Thanksgiving Parade is a joke. Numbers will be down for a start, what with New York’s population being around 20 million and ours being 2.5. Do our elected members honestly believe that people will travel across the globe to be with us on that glorious June 20 day. Of course not, they’d rather use their money to visit the Empire State building and shop at Macy’s.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Manchester, and many local businesses would benefit substantially from such an event, but I don’t think another parade at this crucial economic time is the best way forward. However, I’m willing to change my opinion if a town hall bod was to present me with a spreadsheet explaining that after covering all the costs of staging, policing and cleaning up after this event it would make a sizeable profit for the city’s coffers with something left over for charity.

Only then will I invest in a pink dragon costume.

14 is just too young to have a child

I was outraged when I read the comments of Booker Prize-winning novelist Hilary Mantel suggesting girls are ready to have babies at 14. The highly educated Glossop woman who has written 13 books blames society’s “male timetable” for forcing young women to suppress their instincts and delay motherhood. But when I read how endometriosis had wrecked her life and chances of having children from her early 20s, it put her comments into context. She obviously feels that she would have been fulfilled if she’d had a child before the onset of the illness. That said, many women have had to cope with being childless and don’t spout irresponsible comments which can have a damaging effect on teenagers. Anyone who has visited a centre for schoolgirl mums, as I have, will understand that girls of 14, though physically capable of having children, are not mature enough to be mothers and need a considerable amount of outside help to get them through.

Meet the carpenter girls

The Women’s Institute is moving away from jam and Victoria Sponge-making in favour of DIY. B&Q has been called in to teach members the basics of home improvement from fixing leaks to attaching hooks, which leaves me with a disturbing thought - that the WI 2011 calendar may well feature naked ladies brandishing power drills and chain saws. Carpenter girls, not calendar girls. I shudder at the thought.